f the 13th century.

But this isolation was due even more to the direct trade between the
planters and the foreign merchants than to the extent of the
plantations. This was made possible by the nature of the waterways.
The entire country was intersected with rivers, inlets and creeks that
were deep enough to float the sea going vessels of the age, and salt
water penetrated the woods for miles, forming of the whole country, as
John Fiske has expressed it, a sylvan Venice. Thus it was possible for
each planter to have his own wharf and to ship his tobacco directly
from his own estate. Moreover, it allowed him to receive from the
foreign vessels what merchandise he desired to purchase. Hugh Jones
wrote, "No country is better watered, for the conveniency of which
most houses are built near some landing-place; so that anything may be
delivered to a gentleman there from London, Bristol, &c., with less
trouble and cost, than to one living five miles in the country in
England; for you pay no freight from London and but little from
Bristol; only the party to whom the goods belong, is in gratitude
engaged to ship tobacco upon the ship consigned to her owners in
England."[49]

This system, so remarkably convenient for the planters, was continued
throughout the entire colonial period despite the many efforts made to
change it. The Virginians could not be induced to bring their tobacco
to towns for the purposes of shipping when the merchant vessels could
so easily land at their private wharves. The merchants had less reason
to like the system, for it forced them to take their vessels into
remote and inconvenient places; to spend much valuable time in going
from plantation to plantation before their vessels were laden; to keep
accounts with many men in many different places.[50] The sailors too
complained of the custom, for they were frequently required to roll
the tobacco in casks many yards over the ground to the landings,
causing them much greater trouble than in loading in other countries.
For this reason they are said to have had a great dislike of the
country. Throughout the 17th century and even later the English
government made repeated efforts to break up this system but without
success, for the saving to the planters by local shipping was so great
that threats and even attempted coercion could not make them give it
up.

It is this that is chiefly responsible for the lack of towns in
Virginia during the entire 17th centu